When it comes to engineering, building, and designing something that will be used by humans, safety is the most important step in the entire process. It should be taken very seriously by all who are involved in a project, but the engineers should be the ones who double, triple or even quadruple check safety issues. Mainly the engineers because it is in their code and law of ethics and safety is the first Canon on the list, “Hold paramount the safety, health, and welfare of the public.” (NSPE, 2012).
There are very bad consequences that happen when someone decides not to fallow the Code of Ethics for Engineers, for example the Space shuttle challenger disaster that happened in January of 1986. There were issues with parts and conflicts with decision making that violated the Code of Ethics and 7 people died because of it.
On January 28th 1986 NASA was launching the space shuttle named Challenger and mission 51L a routine mission to carry cargo and satellites for scientific research but because of poor weather and because of the failure of some O-rings to seal tight, some combustion gas leaked and the Challenger in sense blew up. Now, Morton-Thiokol was awarded the contract to build the solid rocket booster for NASA and they did a fine job with it until it was discovered in 1981 that the O-ring for the obiter was eroding over time. The engineers of Morton-Thiokol did right in telling their contractors, NASA, about the issue, “but it was “down-played” as a low risk situation” due to the desire need and pressure from the government to stay on schedule after already being canceled 6 times (Forrest, 2005).
The Research paper on Challenger Case Study
... the technical concerns of subordinate engineers. Lastly, safety and well-being should have ... that mounted up to cause the challenger space shuttle disaster. The central ... paid any attention to the issue. The technical problems could have ... of the Thiokol engineers. Improving communication between NASA managers, engineers, and superiors was ... off. Also the IEEE code of ethics states that one has “to ...
Right there is an example of violation of ethics. Section III, number 2, letter B says that plans should not be completed or signed that don’t conform with engineering standards.
Putting an eroding piece of one of the most dangerous part of the rocket low risk level doesn’t sound like sound like engineering standards and it sure as heck doesn’t sound safe for the astronauts to fly with, which safety is a Canon of the Code of Ethics. Meaning it is very important and shouldn’t be over looked. Based on the Code of Ethics I would have done everything in my power to make point that an eroding O-ring is a safety hazard that cannot be over looked, and even if it was over looked make sure that launch day was at the least on a day with better conditions. If the “Ethical Line” of placing a piece which could be vital to the success of a safe launch under low risk wasn’t crossed there wouldn’t have been a chance to encroach upon the Code of Ethics.
It all could have been prevented if politics didn’t get involved and add to the pressure of launching the orbiter. What these astronauts go through to become every little kids dream job is very rigorous. Those who do make it and go through training are very much appropriate and ready for the risks that come with the position of being hurled in to space. One of the risks is life because these amazing machine that can carry a human being in to the vastness of space are still just machines that are made by humans with human error and the astronauts know that is what they are risking and what they are willing to risk because the people who died on the Challenger helped many more survive in the future. Just like all the other failed missions.
The failure of the Challenger was for the benefit of future excursions, because now engineers know that an eroding O-ring can cause problems and always for safety launch in good weather. Former NASA Administrator Dan Goldin said it best with his quote, but this knowledge would not have been known had it not been for the 24 individuals that risked their life for the benefit space exploration.
The Essay on Challenger Space Shuttle 2
January 28, 1986, the Space Shuttle Challenger the 25 th space shuttle mission, was set to be launched from Kennedy Space Center in Florida at, 11: 38 am. Originally the launch was scheduled for January 22, at 3: 43 pm but had been set back several times due to bad weather. Hopes ran high the anticipation for the lift off was tremendous. This was to be one of the greatest missions ever. It would ...
Texas A & M Department of Mechanical Engineering. (2012).
Retrieved from
http://www.wasscholars.org/moodle/pluginfile.php/5617/mod_assign/intro/Challenger Disaster Ethics Overview.pdf Forrest, J. (2005, October 05).
The space shuttle challenger disaster. Retrieved from
http://dssresources.com/cases/spaceshuttlechallenger/index.html NSPE. (2012, December 2).
National society of professional engineers. Retrieved from
http://www.nspe.org/Ethics/CodeofEthics/index.html
Greene, N. (n.d.).
ask.com part 1: The launch and disaster. Retrieved from
http://space.about.com/cs/challenger/a/challenger.htm
